Chapter 83

THE MORAL CONCEPTS

146. GOOD AND BAD; RIGHT AND WRONG.--As a rule, men reflect little touching the moral terms which are on their lips every day. It is well worth while to take some of them up and to turn them over for examination.

We may use the terms "good" and "bad," "right" and "wrong," in a very broad sense. A "good" trick may be a contemptible action; the "right" way to crack a bank-safe may be the means to the successful commission of a crime. Evidently, the words, thus used, are not employed in a moral sense.

When we pass judgments from the moral point of view, we concern ourselves with men and with their actions, and measure them by the standard of the social will. Men and actions are "good," when they can meet the test. Actions are "right" or "wrong," when they are in accordance with the dictates of the moral law, or are at variance with them. That an act may be both right and wrong, when viewed from different standpoints, even on moral ground, we have seen in Chapter XXX. A man may mean to do right, and may, through ignorance or error, be guilty of an act that we condemn. To the intelligent, confusions are here unnecessary. But the history of ethics is full of confusions in just this field.

147. DUTY AND OBLIGATION.--Verbal usage sometimes justifies the use of one of these words, and sometimes that of the other. We say: I did my duty; we do not say: I did my obligation. But this is a mere matter of verbal expression, and we are really concerned with two names for the same thing.

(1) There has been much dispute as to whether the sense of duty or moral obligation can or cannot be analyzed. It has been declared unanalyzable and unique. Some think this a point of much importance which imparts a peculiar sacredness to the sense of duty.

There appears no reason why this position should be taken. No one has been able to analyze into its ultimate sensational elements the peculiar feeling one has when one is tickled. But this does not make the feeling sacred or awe-inspiring. The authority of the sense of duty must be looked for in another direction--and authority it has.

(2) I have spoken of the "sense" of duty. We all recognize that, when we are faced with a duty, a feeling is normally present. But the whole argument of this volume has maintained that man is not to be treated only as the subject of emotions. He is a rational being. In some persons feeling is very prominent; in others it is less so. It is quite conceivable that, in a given case, a man capable of reflection should recognize that he is confronted with a duty, and yet that he should feel no impulse to perform it. Did no one ever feel any such impulse, the whole system of duties, the whole rational order of society itself, would dissolve and disappear.

Fortunately, the normal man does feel an impulse to perform duties recognized as such. And in the case of those exceptional persons who do not, society strives to supply surrogates, extraordinary impulses based upon a system of rewards and punishments. This is a mere supplement, and could never keep alive a society from which the sense of duty had disappeared.

Duty _is_ sacred. It is the very foundation of every rational society. It does not greatly concern ethics whether the impulse, which makes itself felt in men who want to do their duty, can or cannot be analyzed. But it is all-important that they should feel the impulse.

(3) Can a man do more than his duty? Is it the duty of everyone to be, not merely a good, average, honest, faithful, law-abiding citizen, but to go far beyond this and be conspicuously a saint?

It should be remembered that we are concerned with the connotation properly to be given to a word in common use.

A certain amount of goodness the social will appears to demand of men rather peremptorily. Its demands seem to vary somewhat with the exigencies of the times--for example, in peace and in war. It does not make the same demands of all men. From those to whom much has been given-- wealth, education, social or political influence,--much is required. From certain persons it appears to be glad to get anything. If they keep out of the police-court, it is agreeably surprised.

I have no desire to dissuade anyone from the arduous pursuit of sainthood; but I submit that the word "duty," as sanctioned by usage, implies but a limited demand, and takes cognizance of character and environment. He who comes up to this moderate standard is not condemned; but he is free to go farther and to become as great a saint as he pleases. In which case, we admire him. Those who, in the past, have spoken of "counsels of perfection," have drawn upon a profound knowledge of human nature and of human societies.

148. REWARD AND PUNISHMENT.--We saw in the last chapter (Sec 144) that it is something of a criticism upon man and upon societies of men that extraordinary rewards have to be given and that punishments must be inflicted.

More attention has been paid to punishments than to rewards, and the question touching the proper aim of punishment in a civilized state has received much discussion. The study of the history of the infliction of punishment is suggestive, but it does not shed a clear light. The social will has not always been a rational social will, and some of its decisions may be placed among the curiosities of literature. Still, they may serve the purpose of the traditional "terrible example."

Should we, in punishing, aim at the prevention of crime? Are punishments to be "deterrent"? Under this head we must consider, not merely the criminal himself, but also those who are in more or less danger of becoming criminals, though they have, as yet, committed no known crime.

Should the aim of punishment be the reformation of the criminal?

Should we punish merely that "justice" be done? He who steals and eats fruit is visited with punishment, in the course of nature, if the fruit is unripe. But he suffers equally if he eats his own fruit, under like conditions. This seems a blind punishment. Should we visit pain upon him for the theft, merely because it is a theft, and without looking abroad for any other reason?

Light appears to be thrown upon these problems when we reflect that punishment is an instrument, employed by the Rational Social Will, in pursuance of its ends.

(1) It is desirable that men should be deterred from committing crime. If this cannot be done save by the infliction of punishment, then let men be punished. But be it remembered that punishment is a regrettable necessity, and that the occasions for the infliction of penalties may greatly be diminished by the amelioration of the organism of society. There is the born criminal, as there is the born inmate of an asylum for the insane. But there is also the manufactured criminal; the product of the slum, the victim of ignorance, the prey of the walking-delegate, the sufferer from over-work and undernourishment, the inhabitant of the filthy and overcrowded tenement, the man robbed of his self-respect, who has no share in the sweetness and light of civilization. A society that first manufactures criminals and then expends great sums in punishing them is, in so far, not rational.

(2) It is desirable that the criminal should be reformed and returned to society as a normal man. But this is not the one and only aim of the social will. The whole flock should not be sacrificed to the one black sheep, as some sentimental persons appear to believe. There is room here for the exercise of judgment and of some cool calculation.

(3) As for the demand that a given pain shall be inflicted for a given wrong done, irrespective of any gain to anybody, and irrespective of consequences,--it appears to carry one back to ancient and primitive law.

Undoubtedly many punishments have been inflicted in the past to satisfy the sense of resentment. [Footnote: It may be objected that we are not concerned here with resentment but with the satisfaction of "justice." Men's notions of the "justice" of punishments have been touched upon in